Andy Serkis Talks ‘Rise of the Planet of the Apes’ Sequel, ‘Animal Farm’

When it comes to motion capture performances, Andy Serkis is pretty much the only big name in the business. His groundbreaking performance as the obsessive Gollum in The Lord of the Rings trilogy was largely responsible for putting the technology on the map, and Serkis has since turned in impressive mo-cap performances in films like The Adventures of Tintin and Rise of the Planet of the Apes.

“The interesting thing now will be how Caesar operates in this world – because of the virus that hits at the end of the first movie – and how Caesar brings an accord between the apes and the surviving humans and that’s going to be interesting where we take that.”

This follows suit with the conclusion of Rise, in which Caesar took command of the ape uprising. As previously speculated, it sounds like the sequel will continue that thread, rather than jumping ahead in time to the post-apocalyptic world that results from the apes’ revolt.

Serkis also talked about his upcoming Animal Farm, which he’ll direct under The Imaginarium, his London-based performance capture studio. Some visual testing for the film – which will combine performance capture, facial performance capture and puppetering – has already begun. According to Serkis:

“Because of the way of shooting it using performance capture, you can pre-vis and you can start working on it now, so we’re very much into it in terms of character designs, concept, art department, all of that stuff is going on right now and we aim to shoot it at the end of 2013.”

Regarding the film’s creative direction, Serkis says that he already has an as-yet-unnamed screenwriter in mind and that he aims to modernize the 67-year-old source material a bit so that it fits today’s issues.

“[We’re] taking it from the point of view if Orwell were writing Animal Farm for today, where would the targets be? It’s a fairy tale and we’re keeping it as a fairy tale and a fable, which will allow us to satirically pick our target.”

It’s worth noting that Serkis served as second unit director for The Hobbit, and so he already has some experience helming a fairy tale.

Do you think Serkis is the right man to bring Animal Farm to life? Does the Apes sequel sound like a worthy follow-up to the 2011 film? Sound off in the comments.

The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey hits theaters on December 14th, and Dawn of the Planet of the Apes opens on May 23rd, 2014. Stay tuned to Screen Rant for more information on these films as well as when we can expect to see Serkis’ take on Animal Farm.